ROCHESTER A.B.O.V.E.

Midge Thomas is well known for her dedicated volunteer services, especially in human services.  Ms. Thomas is a life member of Memorial AME Zion Church, National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs, Inc. and the Freddie Thomas Foundation.

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Dr. Arlette Miller Smith

When your life teaches,

Your heart sings, and

Your soul writes,

Then you have become acquainted with the passions of

Arlette Miller Smith

ARLETTE MILLER SMITH, a native of Vicksburg, Mississippi, is an Associate Professor in the Department of English, adjunct faculty member in the Executive Leadership doctoral program, and co-director of the African American Studies (AFAM) minor at St. John Fisher College since June, 2008. Miller Smith began her work at Fisher in the summer of 1997 with a dual appointment as an assistant professor of English and associate dean for diversity initiatives. In June, 2002, she was appointed as the Dean who oversees diversity initiatives at the College. In August of 2002, diversity programs became the Office of Multicultural Affairs and Diversity Programs. Under Miller Smith’s leadership a number of campus and community diversity-related projects evolved including the current Campus Climate Project, as well as the following: Campus Diversity Advisory Board (CDAB); the Distinguished Community Leaders’ Forum; Campus Read Project; Pre-K @ College initiative; Gay Alliance Higher Education Series; Day of Celebration; the expanded Annual Martin Luther King Celebration; Project Build collaborative with the Rochester City School District. 

Arlette is proud to have received from St. John Fisher’s student body, the prestigious Father Dorsey Award given to a faculty member who contributes time and resources to the development of student programming initiatives and projects.  She advises a number of student organizations, both formally and informally, including the gospel choir, Black Student Union and Fisher Pride. She also is the 2009 recipient of Fisher’s Bricoleur Award for Diversity which recognizes distinguished campus and community service related to inclusive excellence.

Former Dean Miller Smith is the recipient of a number of community awards, including the 2008 Harriet Tubman Humanitarian Achievement Award “for the championing  and service on behalf of improving the quality of life for the poor, the powerless, and the persecuted;” the Genesee Valley Girl Scouts of America’s 2005 Woman of Influence in the Arts Award; the Rochester Urban League’s Educator of the Year Award; the Links' Outstanding Community Educator Award, and the Negro Business and Professional Club's prestigious Sojourner Truth Award; and the 2009 African American Citizen of the Year Award from Rochester A.B.O.V.E. (Africans Between Oceans with Visions of Empowerment)

 Arlette has served on several local boards and community initiatives including BOA Editions; Rochester City School District African & African American Council; Rochester Women’s Network (RWN); the Urban League of Rochester; the former Bi-Racial Community Partners Program (currently known as the Mosaic Partnership Program); the Commission on Race and Ethnicity; organizing committee of the AALDP (African American Leadership Development Program);and the New York-Penn Regional Red Cross Blood Services Board.

Miller Smith is the founder/executive director of AKOMA (www.akoma.org), Rochester’s African American Women’s Gospel Choir, which is comprised of more than forty-five women from more than twenty churches throughout the Rochester area. 

Dr. Miller Smith also is a BlackLiteraryHerstorian---that is, she is a woman who chronicles the herstory of her African American people and their armored resistance to oppression and discrimination. Miller Smith’s “We in Anticipation of You” was selected as the opening poem for the 2009 publication of the book, Go, Tell Michelle:  African American Women Write to the New First Lady (eds Peggy Brooks-Bertram and Barbara Seals-Nevergold). Miller Smith was introduced to and became passionate about literature, motivational speaking, and history by a cadre of committed teachers, family members, and friends in her birthplace: Vicksburg, Mississippi.

Miller Smith received her undergraduate degree in English/African American Literature from Tougaloo College; her Masters in English from Michigan State University; and her doctorate in American Studies (Women’s Studies) from the University of Buffalo.

Miller Smith is married to Art, a retiree from Electronic Data Systems (EDS). They have two adult children and two grandchildren.

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Senior Minister Franklin D. Florence, I. has committed his life to the task of preaching the Gospel. In his youth, he was one of the "boy preachers" who traveled extensively as teenagers with esteemed ministers such as Evangelist Marshall Keeble.

Prior to accepting the pastorate of the Central Church of Christ, he served as Pastor of the West Palm Beach Church of Christ in Florida, and for several years as the pastor of the Reynolds Street Church of Christ (now known as the East Henrietta Road Church of Christ).

Franklin D. Florence, I. is well known in the Rochester, New York community and nationally as "Minister Florence," the name that became synonymous with his social activism as the first President of the F. I. G. H. T. Organization (Freedom-Independence-God-Honor-Today).

His activism is fueled by his strong conviction that Christians and the church must be leaders in causes for social justice and equality. His conviction has not always been deemed favorable in many religious circles where the thought was (and often remains) that the church should separate itself from the social/political arena.

Minister Florence is a dynamic personality and a visionary pioneering leader. He has been blessed to see - and countless others have enjoyed - the rewards of his social justice efforts. The Rochester community and area communities owe him a debt of gratitude for the sacrificial work he has done in helping to open doors to fair employment and subsidized housing. He has also been a consistent voice and presence for quality academic and social education in our public school system.

Minister Florence has also been intricately involved in programs to improve correctional institutions, and he was one of the Ministers who labored so desperately to prohibit the massacre at the Attica Correctional Institution in the 1970's. His papers that document his involvement in this crusade and others are on file at the University of Rochester Library.

Minister Franklin D. Florence, I. is a spiritual man and a student of the Scriptures who is deeply committed to the Gospel of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. He has made many sacrifices for its furtherance. He is a "Much-in-Demand" Preacher of the Gospel and has been called to preach for Gospel campaigns all over the United States of America. Untold numbers of people have committed their lives to Christ as a result of Minister Florence's "Scripturally Sound" preaching and teaching. Because of his knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, his spiritual insights, and his tenacity, he is frequently called to local and out-of-state congregations to help solve problems to bring about greater unity in the Body of Christ. In so doing, he heeds the words of the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 1:10: "Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment."